Who's In Control
by Aramira
Summary: Logan was a complex man, but the Wolverine was simple. Sex, violence and survival were what drove him. But who was really in charge? ONESHOT. Rating for language and adult themes.


**A/N: Strong language alert. Also I don't own the X-Men (sadly).**

**Who's in Control?**

Logan thought he was in control. He was the one who walked around in public, looking and acting human. But there was always a part of him that fought to get out. He let it roam free at night, in his dreams, no matter how disturbing that sometimes was. And when there was violence to be done. Logan was good at violence, but the Wolverine _was_ violence.

Most people didn't have such a division between the civilized parts of themselves and the primal. They only touched their primal beings in extreme situations, of which there was blessedly few for most. Most people only had to rely on their basest forms when faced with life or death situations.

Logan had a chance once to watch a woman as she laboured. He wondered how women were able to cage the animal that gave birth when the babe was in their arms. He had felt the Wolverine respond to the woman, and it wasn't pleasant. The desire to rip them both to shreds was disturbingly close to the surface. Though neither the woman nor the child were his, his desire to exterminate the child who wasn't of his seed and take the woman made him sick to his stomach for weeks afterwards.

Logan was a complex man, but the Wolverine was simple. Sex, violence and survival were what drove him. Logan sometimes felt like an animal thanks to that but then something would happen to remind him he was more than that. Being solitary it was ironically a nature scene that often reminded him who he was, to whatever extent he understood that to be. A casual glance out the window of his truck would afford him a view that touched his poetic side. Of course the Wolverine tried to tell him he was being a pussy but Logan was the one in charge. At least, he _had_ been the one in charge.

Lately the Wolverine was getting stronger, gaining more footholds in Logan's psyche, and it was all _her_ fault. When he didn't abandon her on the side of the road the Wolverine snarled at him, but it was already too late. The wench had broken in, broken through, simply by asking him one fucking question. 'Does it hurt when they come out?'

With all the shit that came later, it was that one question that reverberated through him. Sometimes the urge to take off would be too strong to ignore and he would leave, search for his past the way he had always done. Then it was to escape what he had done at Alcatraz. But he always came back, came back for _her_.

When boozing and whoring and fighting hadn't erased the memory he surrendered to it. The Wolverine howled when he did that but soon realized that this gave him free reign over Logan, when Logan was lost in the memories the Wolverine could play. And play the Wolverine did. Logan found himself having to spend half his earnings from his fights in order to smooth over whatever damage he'd done to the same bar.

Logan had eventually wrested control back from the Wolverine, and found himself back at the school. And here he was losing it again. It started when he first smelled sex on Marie. _His_ Marie! He wasn't her father, he was her friend, but that protective instinct which he'd never been sure was his or the Wolverine's demanded violence on whomever had violated her.

Clearly Bobby felt this whenever Logan was in the room and made himself scarce whenever possible, this made Logan _and_ the Wolverine smirk. She somehow was oblivious to it and vaguely wondered why she rarely saw the two men in her life in the same room together.

Marie talked to Logan during the day and the Wolverine fucked her senseless at night in Logan's dreams. Logan would wake feeling violated but he had long ago given his dreams to the Wolverine and despite any unpleasant feelings in the morning he could remind himself that they were just dreams. Not fantasies of his, but simply the base urges of his inner animal. He would have bet his motorcycle that the icedick felt the same way, despite how polite he was during the day.

Logan was gone for a couple months, along the way he ran into an old 'friend'. The green man was in the same bar as Logan. Logan was there to fight, so was Toad. They sat side by side at the bar, watching the current match. "Where you been hiding?" Logan asked him.

"Here and there. Magneto's not the forgiving sort."

"He lost his powers, didn't you know?"

"Huh." Then there was silence from the pair as the match ended with a knockout. "I'm up." Toad shed his coat and walked into the cage, Logan watched as he took out opponent after opponent. Soon the crowd was roaring for more. Logan placed his bets and climbed in.

"No claws Wolverine." Toad said just loud enough for Logan to hear.

"I don't need claws to do what I do." He lunged at Toad and the fight was on. Toad was the most worthy opponent Logan had ever fought in a cage but he was really no match. As Logan was leaving the cage, the unconscious man behind him, the ref made a comment. Logan replied, "I'm the best there is at what I do, but what I do isn't very nice".

Logan returned to the school some weeks after that to find he had a situation. Marie and the icedick had broken up, now every male in the school was on the prowl for her, but thank fuck Marie didn't want anything to do with them. She was training twice as hard now and she was keeping up with him in the Danger Room. The Wolverine was having a field day at night, and worst of all, Logan could feel the balance of power changing.

He could feel the Wolverine stalking Marie when she was around, and growling when she touched him. Which she did a lot. Not having her powers anymore she seemed to be making up for lost time, so she touched everything. And him. She would hug him when she saw him, sit next to him and let their legs touch, she would touch his arm when they were talking, and it was all innocent.

One evening she fell asleep next to him on the couch, her head on his shoulder. The next morning he woke up with sticky sheets and a heavy feeling in the pit of his stomach. The Wolverine had used Marie in his dreams and the Wolverine had made him watch. Logan wasn't sure which was more distressing, the things the Wolverine did to her or that he found himself wanting to do those things to her himself.

Logan made an effort to fight off the Wolverine, but one day in the Danger Room he lost control completely. It was only for half a minute, but that minute was more than enough to fuck him over. It was just him and Marie, doing their usual drills, but this time the level of difficulty was raised. Marie got a cut on her arm, it bled but wasn't bad enough to bother stopping in the middle of the scenario.

Logan could feel the Wolverine responding to the smell of real blood and he was having a harder time fighting him off in the exertion and violence. Then he ended up grabbing Marie and pressing her into a wall to avoid a blast. That's when he smelled it, _fuck, _she was ovulating and the smell was driving the Wolverine insane.

Marie moved for a better view and her hip brushed his groin. Logan felt himself being shoved aside as the Wolverine took over. His arms wrapped around her waist and lifted her up, shoving her against the wall, his other arm wrapped in her hair behind her head. Before she could speak he crushed her to him and kissed her hard.

Logan wanted to let the Wolverine take over, but he loved Marie and couldn't stand the idea that he would take her, even if it wasn't the major part of him. So he wrenched control back and dropped Marie like she was on fire, then he turned tail and ran. He was oblivious to whatever she was calling out after him. Then the world went black.

He came to in the Danger Room, the scenario was either off or over and he groaned as he felt his head wound healing. He turned his head and saw Marie kneeling next to him, her hands on his chest. "Logan? Logan are you all right?" Her voice had an edge of panic. It seemed that no matter how many times he came back from certain death, Marie was always afraid the last time was really the last time.

"Yeah, what happened?"

"You got hit with a missile."

"Yeah, that's what it feels like." He sat up and faced her as he continued to heal. They both stood and headed for the door. As his healing became complete his memories of the moments before he got hit came flooding back. Ice gripped his chest and he burst into the locker room, starting to swear as he did so.

He wanted to hurl things at the walls but he knew Marie would hear him and check on him. Lord only knew what she thought about the kiss, maybe she was on her way upstairs to tell Storm he assaulted her right now. He hid in the locker room for half an hour, enraging the Wolverine who demanded over and over that they go finish claiming the girl.

When her scent had fully faded from the hallway Logan was calm enough to take care of himself, shower and go upstairs. He hid in his room until hunger drove him out in the dead of night into the kitchen. He heard footsteps in the hall and he grabbed his food and bolted, he didn't go to his room in case it was Marie looking for him, instead he ended up in a classroom. As he ate the Wolverine screamed and raged that he was hiding, _hiding_ from the woman the Wolverine wanted.

Logan went back to his room. The Wolverine showed him what he was missing out on as he slept. Morning brought more disgust at himself. But he couldn't avoid Marie forever so he went to her room. He knocked but there was no answer, no one seemed to know where she was so Logan took the opportunity to take off on his motorcycle, maybe regain some of his previous control on the road.

He came back in time for dinner and though Marie was there she wouldn't meet his eyes and he sunk even lower inside himself. _Fuck_. After dinner Marie disappeared and Logan followed her scent to her room. He knocked and when she came to the door he pushed in, not giving her time to tell him to get lost. "We need to talk about yesterday."

Marie turned her back to him and Logan wanted to slam his hand through the wall. _Damn it_, he'd really fucked up this time. Her voice was heavy with emotion, but what emotion he didn't know. "Why did you do it?"

"I just lost control."

"Of what?" Logan sighed and ran his hand through his hair. He tried to explain.

"You've seen me fight, really fight." He started to pace and she followed him with her eyes. "When I fight it's usually me, but if I have to _really_ fight, then it's the Wolverine that takes over. You remember when Stryker attacked the school? When they took the children last year?" Marie nodded, remembering the ferocity which had so frightened anyone with any sense.

"That was the Wolverine. It's almost like a split-personality. Do you understand?"

"Logan, he's inside me too." Logan nearly sat where he stood, he only just managed to make it to the bed. Sometimes he forgot that she had nearly drained him fully, twice. It had never occurred to him that the Wolverine would be in her head as well. "I know what he's like."

"God Marie, I had no idea, I'm so sorry." A faint smile touched her face.

"It's ok, I've learned to live with him. With you too." Her smile expanded as she teased him. Logan felt some hope that at least she didn't hate him. "But that doesn't explain what happened, or why."

Logan ran his hands through his hair again and tried to gather his thoughts. Marie made this more difficult by sitting right next to him. "You know that he's a creature of base instincts right?" It was quite odd to be talking about himself in the third person, almost like that aspect of himself was an entirely separate being. Marie nodded. "Well, sex is one of them. And you're the closest woman in my life."

"So it was just proximity?"

"No. Yes. Well not exactly."

"Well that clears things up." Her tone was wry and he tried to explain.

"He's claimed you, thinks you're his, mine I mean." Logan stopped, wondering if this was the part where she slapped him, told him he was disgusting and that she never wanted to see him again.

"Since when?"

"Well, since always, but more so in the last few months."

"And what was different about yesterday?"

"It was the blood. The smell of real blood, _your_ blood that brought him out, then when we were pressed together like that- It didn't matter to him why." Logan wasn't going to tell her that it was also because she was ovulating, like he needed _that_ kind of shit in her head. "I'm sorry." It was all he could say.

"For kissing me or for stopping?" Suddenly he froze, she couldn't have said what he just thought he heard right? Then he felt her hand on his thigh. The Wolverine wanted him to take her now, and he found himself wanting what the Wolverine wanted too.

"If I hadn't stopped then I wouldn't have been able to stop him at all."

"Did you want to?"

"It's not about what I want."

"Oh really? What _is_ it about then?" Her voice was dangerous. "I know what he's like Logan, we all have a part just like him inside us, most of us never meet them. But he's you whether you like it or not. So what do _you_ want Logan?" She grabbed his face and wrenched it over to look at her.

Numerous responses rolled through his head but he rejected them all and just kissed her. The Wolverine growled when she kissed him back but he shoved him aside. It was the Wolverine's turn to watch while Logan claimed Marie, _their_ Marie.


End file.
